All language subtitles for Cane Toads - An Unnatural History

One male and one female, is enough
to populate all the Northern Territory.

The best thing is to get rid of them.
Get a big stick and hit him with it.

The practice of going out to get one of
these and putting him into a billy ..

And boiling it down and eating the
residue, I think is absolutely repulsive.

When I'm driving, I have no hesitation
in running over them whatsoever.

I couldn't do without them.
They're friends.

I can recall quite vividly seeing
cane-grubs early in the morning.

The beetles used to fly out early in
the morning, and land on the cane.

The cane was weighted down with beetles.

The trees surrounding the cane farms
weighted down with beetles.

Sometimes farmers would cut around
about 800 tons to a 1000 tons.

And the following year wouldn't
cut a ton at all, hardly.

The situation really became desperate
in the early 1930's.

Due to the combined effect
of grub-attack ..

And the effect of the depression on the
world price of sugar.

So, something had to be done to control
the grub if at all possible.

And of course, the farmers never let up.

On their demands on the Sugar Experiment
Station staff to do something about it.

In 1932 there was a world conference of
sugar technologists held in Puerto Rico.

And we were represented at that
conference by ..

The Assistant Director of the Sugar
Experiment Stations, Mr Arthur Bell.

"I believe this evidence shows that
the bufo-marinus, or cane toad."

"Can be used as a biological control
of the gray-backed grub and beetle."

"And I strongly advocate the effective
use of this amphibian immigrant."

"Which is doing its full share of
benefit to our sugar industry."

And Arthur Bell brought back the idea
that we could introduce the toad.

Into this country from Hawaii.

Mungomery was our entomologist at the
time and he was sent over to Hawaii.

To get a colony of toads together and
bring them back to Australia.

And establish a colony
in North Queensland.

This he did very effectively.

Over the long period, of course.

It was necessary to keep moisture
up to the toads in their crate.

To keep them alive. They couldn't feed
them, during the 2-week trip they ..

Experienced getting down
to Sydney, from Hawaii.

And then, of course, another two days ..

To get them to Maringa
in North Queensland.

Before they could be put into a pond and
into an environment they could relish.

Mungomery treated them very, very well.
He built an elaborate pool at Maringa.

With running water to encourage them to
breed and they reacted to his treatment.

And they began to breed very vigorously.

Yes, I've got vivid memories from when
the toads were first brought here.

They were brought here by a fellow
called Youst.

In a couple of dishes. There was about 40
toads in number, in all.

And they were released in this
particular spot over there.

And of course, my dad was an Irishman.

He was very, very pleased. He was
jubilant about the whole affair.

And more so, that he
said this, and I quote:

"We've got these grubs by the balls this
time, and now we'll go to bigger things."

But tragically, we didn't have the grubs
by the balls. They had us by the balls.

Amplexus is a sexual act, where the
male grasps the female.

And of course, first he's
got to get his female.

And after the rains, when you have big
areas of temporary water, fresh water.

The males will gather around
the pond and they will call.

And a call, or course, attracts the
female. It goes something like this.

And I suppose the female picks the best
or the sweetest of those calls.

And when she approaches close,
the male will then grasp her.

Into Amplexus.

And he does that by getting his
forearms, which are very, very strong.

And he pushes them into the sides,
just under the ribs.

And on the thumb, there is a nuptial pad.
This nuptial pad is very, very sticky.

So that when he pushes the thumbs
into the sides of her abdominal cavity.

The grip is very, very strong and firm.

Of course it's important that this grip
be strong, so that he doesn't fall off.

So that other males, too,
can't push him off.

She takes him into the water.

And she exudes the eggs in long strands.

And as they come out, the male releases
sperm into the water.

Which then fertilizes the eggs.

And these eggs are wrapped
around vegetation.

But usually, it's just left to float
in the water.

One cane toad female can lay up
to 40,000 eggs in a summer.

That's a large number of eggs.

The theory going that they need
40,000 just that two can survive.

To replace the female and the male.

But if you see ponds where cane toads
breed, more than two survive.

The sides of the pond are just black
with young cane toads.

And from what I can see,
a large number of those survive.

The eggs stay in the water and
then they start dividing.

Eventually they start to look like small
tadpoles within the egg sac.

The tadpoles when they get
sufficiently developed ..

Start wriggling and they rupture the
egg-sac and they go into the water.

As tadpoles. And the tadpole is a very
distinctive tadpole.

It's glossy and black.

No other Australian frog has a glossy,
black tadpole.

And then, in the water for
about 4-5 weeks it develops.

The back legs come out,
and then finally the front legs.

And then the tail is re-absorbed and they
move onto the land as small toads.

Well they've been here for 50 years
or a bit more.

And look, there's just millions of
them in this river.

There's certainly no shortage of
cane toads in the area.

They have a tremendous success rate.

They can lay tadpoles in small puddles,
fifteen percent seawater.

Or clear rain rivers like this.
Just about anywhere.

Equally interesting is these tadpoles,
if you look at them very carefully.

Some of them are beginning to get legs.

And they do that in a very, very
small body size.

Native tadpoles have to get much,
much larger than these little fellows.

And so they have to stay in the water
a little bit longer than a cane toad.

So cane toads get in fast,
in big numbers. They're out fast.

At that age their colonization advances
at a tremendous extent.

My first memory of the toad was
the unusual noise that I heard.

In the billabong hole
across from the house.

And I did inquire from our Pest Board
Officer as to what the noise would be.

And that was the giant toad.

They soon came out on
the roads of a night.

And they did look as though
they would really ..

Be a terrible menace. That
they would take possession of everything.

You'd flatten them out with the car.

And the stench from them would be like a
school of mullet coming up the river.

Well one species of cane beetles
in the cane fields.

It just doesn't come in contact
with the ground.

And we know that cane toads can't fly.

And when the other species of cane
beetles came in the cane fields.

It's there when there was no cover
on the ground.

And cane toads just aren't in cane fields
when there isn't any cover.

In short the lifestyles of cane beetles
and the cane toads didn't synchronize.

It couldn't succeed.

They weren't much use at all as far as
the cane beetle was concerned but ..

But they did manage to get rid of
a lot of stray dogs.

The dogs .. would be attracted to these
moving toads and grab them.

And of course, the bufo-marinus only
protection was his poison sac.

And he used to let the dogs have it,
and eventually quite a few dogs died.

You know, looking back over
the years, and so forth.

When you look at our imports, what
we brought in to Australia.

This must have been a great country, long
before white man every came to the joint.

We brought in foxes and hares.

And then, to cap it all off we bring this
monstrous thing called a toad in.

"A man was fined for his impersonation
of two Queensland identities."

"Coming up before Adelaide Magistrates
Court the 32-year old was charged .."

"He was found crouching on the side
of a road in Birkenhead in Adelaide."

"Police say he was jumping out onto the
road into the path of oncoming cars."

"When he was questioned, he told them he
was Sir Jacob Peterson and a cane toad."

"He pleaded guilty to Disorderly
Behavior and was fined 50 dollars."

The toad spread faster and more widely
than we anticipated in the first instance.

And it wasn't long before it got
into Southern Queensland.

And then it attracted a lot of
attention from people who are ..

Not much interested in
controlling cane-grubs.

Queensland toads .. Queensland toads.

They are everywhere you are.

No matter where you roam,
you can hear them from afar.

They hop and they dance,
for every romance.

Queensland toad .. Queensland toad.

They're everywhere you are.

In the cane of the roads.

They'll always be Queensland toads.

The toad was introduced to eight or nine
cane-growing regions and since that time.

They cover about forty percent
of the area of Queensland ..

A small portion of northern New South
Wales and they're moving over through ..

The gulf country and a part
of the Northern Territory.

It's hard to go anywhere in Queensland
without coming across references to ..

Idolatry concerned with the cane
toad, because they are valued.

They are absolutely everywhere. People
are brought up with them, I think.

And Queenslanders are terribly
protective of them, it would seem.

Although something as obnoxious as the
cane toad would be eradicated by now.

Far from it.

They uh, because they've got them
and nobody else has got them.

Much the same as they've got Joe
and nobody else has got him yet.

They .. I think, regard them with
a sort of perverted reverence.

Radio: "Hello. Is this a tall-toad story?
─ "That's right."

"I was in Gordon Tower when they
first released the cane toad."

"Tell me about your recollections.
Well, when they first released them."

"Now, you know what
a kerosene tin is like?"

"Now, dropped straight in they
wouldn't go into a kerosene tin."

"They would have eaten the cat"
─ "That's right."

"They were so massive that if you put one
on a square shovel you couldn't lift it."

"That is true as I stand here."

"You're not pulling my leg?
─ "I'm not. I remember it as yesterday."

There are still quite a large
number of the toads around.

But not as big as they used to be.

But .. I still love the animal.

And they give me .. a lot of enjoyment.

The term that's used to describe that
relationship that toads have with people.

Is "homophilic". Which means
they just love people.

And this is true in so
many different ways.

Because we are just
so kind to the toads.

Usually, we don't know that
we're being so kind to them.

But we provide places for them
to live around our gardens

Under garden gnomes,
in pipes, under houses.

And we supply dinner for them many
nights when we turn lights on.

And the toads sit around the lights and
they eat the insects that come along.

Well, as you see now, I have ..

Quite a few, which I
attract by using a light.

Which is not very powerful,
which attracts insects.

And also, occasionally
I feed them Whiskettes.

Laurence started feeding the
toads Whiskettes because ..

They started robbing the
cat's dishes Whiskettes.

So I used to put dishes of Whiskettes
out, and they didn't come inside.

So, everybody was happy.

You can hear a noise in the background.
Which is a toad, probably mating.

And that's what I like about them.

The way they dart at things.
The way they hide.

They're cunning enough to
peek out behind things.

They can be behind a leaf
or something like that.

If you're quick enough you will see their
eyes watching you wherever you go.

I definitely think they are
a harmless animal.

And nobody's got any right
to fear about them.

I'm not sure whether I would call
them pets, exactly. But uh ..

They are mates, as far as I'm concerned.

We often see them mating right
here in front of us, on the lawn.

They are a magnificent animal.

If you just take the
care and watch them.

And just see how they act
under different circumstances.

That's the hard question. To think of
them as friends. They are just friends.

Friends I suppose because they are
around the place.

You get used to them. You look for them.

You know when they're singing.
They are calling.

It's not only a pleasant noise,
it's a friendly noise. And I love it.

They are harmless.

And uh .. they jump .. they jump on us.

They jump on my feet and they
have no fear at all.

Of coming near me or anybody
that's with me.

"There are some people that want the
cane toad recognized for what it's done."

"For Queensland particularly, and they
were going to erect a statue in honor."

At Gordonvale on the
road approach to Cairns.

Well, the proposal to
commemorate the cane toad.

Was brought before the Bi-Centennial
Committee of the Council.

To recall a unique part of
North Australia's history.

It was released from Maringa,
just outside Gordon Park.

There was going to be a cane toad bust a
metre high sitting on a 2-foot pedestal.

So all up, about five feet.

And it was going to be
a photographer's delight.

And the kids could sit on its
shoulders and whatnot.

And all together it was going to be,
like the dog sitting on the tucker box.

Five miles from Gundagai, and
with that sort of tourist potential.

And surely, this bastard can't
be in his right frame of mind.

Fancy wanting to erect a monument to this
sort of creature that's been brought in.

The council came to the conclusion that
it wasn't in the best interests to do so.

Personally, I was
extremely disappointed.

Because I felt that this
was our big chance ..

To get a unique feature into our
tourist development industry.

Our young, developing tourist
industry, where it was very special.

And the fact that it didn't come
to fruition, and I might add ..

With not spending a penny of ratepayers
money, as it was a Bi-Centennial project.

I felt that we missed
the boat just a little bit.

Well Bill Colburn from the Department
Of Defense came and saw me.

And asked could I bind a book for Prince
Charles and Lady Di as a wedding present.

And he said he wanted
something very special.

And .. I thought .. oh, cane toads.

It took me about a month to
join five or six skins together.

And .. that's the finished product.

The Department Of Defense received a
letter from Buckingham Palace.

And it reads:

"We are overwhelmed by your kindness in
sending us such a fine wedding present."

"Thank you so much for taking all the
trouble to find something which .. "

"Is so greatly appreciated and will bring
pleasure to us through our married life."

"Yours sincerely, Charles."

The cane toad poison is a
mixture of several compounds.

And one group of compounds are
steroids which affect heart muscle.

And these are known as
bufo-toxins generally.

Well, these of course,
are the toxins that kill.

As a mammologist I always had native
animals around me that I was studying.

I had a western native cat, that was a
pet. It had been with us for five years.

It had been very important
to me as a study animal.

The moment we got to Brisbane, I let it
out into the back yard as I usually did.

It had the run of the
outside and the inside.

The first thing it did was rush over and
grabbed what looked like a gigantic frog.

I never even thought about what it was.

I didn't think any more about it. That's
a natural thing for a native cat to do.

But, about two minutes later, the animal
was obviously in some kind of trouble.

It stuck its tongue out, was salivating
and rolling around on the ground.

Within twenty minutes, that
beautiful, unique animal.

Which I was totally in love with, this
was something I was really wrapped up in.

Died in my arms,
in cardiac contractions.

The .. glands that produce
the toxic material.

Are located in the skin.

But they're aggregated over the shoulder,
in this region here .. and here.

And, if you were to press these glands.

You must cover your eyes with glasses if
you're going to engage in this activity.

Then, if you were to
press these glands here.

There! You can see the
venom spurt out at you.

There are numerous pores
over those glands there.

Under pressure, that toxic material
will shoot for about a metre.

All in all, it's quite a cocktail of
compounds. Toxic compounds.

And I think that people would do well
to take care when handling toads.

Hello? Oh hi, Wendy.

After all, people have been killed
as a result of beating toads.

Both in Fiji and in the Philippines.

There are well-recorded instances.

We've taken Eddie down
there a couple of times.

As far as children are concerned, I think
that toads could be a real problem.

Particularly with babies.

The young children who are attracted
by the hopping gate of the toad.

See you then, Wendy. Okay. Bye.

Children being what they are, will
inevitably squeeze the toads.

And probably put them in their
mouths and suck them and so forth.

The results .. could be disastrous.

Edgar!

It was the death of my native cat.

That led me into a kind of internal
revenge against the cane toad.

When I began to come to grips
with what was going on here.

And every time I ended up in
the bush in North Queensland ..

I felt a personal responsibility
to reduce toad numbers.

So I was running around at night and hit
one of the toads with my geology pick.

Hence, it's all my fault. Nevertheless,
it was an unforgettable experience.

The moment my pick hit the back of
the toad, the toad was instantly dead.

But I felt like somebody had hit me
right in the face with baseball bat.

Or like a bee had stung me in the eye.
It was the most excruciating pain.

I'd been hit in the eye by the material
jettisoned out of the gland of this toad.

And it was fully about 6 hours, before I
could actually see out of the eye again.

It's a very incapacitating experience.
One I don't want to go through again.

Don Juan .. says that ..

Some .. some of the South
American Indians, they ..

When they get the mescaline out
of the cactus they say they say ..

That you actually start to see the world
through the consciousness of the cactus.

That you start to see what the world
looks like from the eyes of the cactus.

Well .. the toad's the same.

Bufotenine is the active ingredient
found in the skin of the cane toad.

It is listed as a dangerous drug in
Queensland's Drug Misuse Act.

This means it will attract a maximum
penalty of life imprisonment.

Under the Drugs Act, Queensland Police
have the power to stop and detain people.

And search people they reasonably
suspect of carrying the drug.

And also to place tracking devices on
vehicles they suspect carry the drug.

I first found out about the use of toxins
from the cane toad back in the 1970s.

When I was stationed here as
an investigative detective.

We found that in places like hippie
communes near and around Cairns.

When heroin and other drugs
weren't freely available.

Next best alternative was to go
out, get a cane toad, and kill it.

Boil it down into a solution with a
bit of water, and drink the residue.

The effect that I found out that it had
on them, from what I've been told.

Was that they had fantastic
color hallucinations.

It warped their sense of time, and
also affected their mental capacities.

Um .. and uh .. use .. little quantity
at .. first .. then .. larger.

A .. little .. bit .. at first.
I didn't .. like it .. that much.

"A Townsville man has
claimed that cane toads .."

"Were responsible for the deaths
of 22 of his large goldfish."

"Mr Paul Devine, President of
the Townsville Aquarium Society .."

"Has killed about 200 toads in
an attempt to save his fish."

I think the biggest loss of goldfish I've
had would be the latest time.

When I lost a lot of these fish
with the cane toads.

I lost about 30 goldfish in that time.

The toads attacked the goldfish in the
ponds as they swim around in the water.

The cane toads attacked them and tried
to get on to the fish and strangle them.

Consequently, they
killed quite a few fish.

The cane toads were looking for
someone, something to mate with.

I think that's what they
were trying to do.

In their frenzy to try
and mate with them.

Killed the other fish.

I've had them try to mate with my foot.
I've had attempt to amplex with my hand.

But most of often, I've seen them trying
to amplex with humps of mud.

Once I realized what the cause was, I
started to get rid of all the cane toads

By killing the cane toads.

I got a piece of pipe and went about
getting rid of all these cane toads.

Quite a lot of the cane toads were
quite hard to kill.

I got a knife put on. After a period of
a week, I killed hundreds of cane toads.

They are a bit of a rough bunch. They're
alright outside the pond, but not in it.

"On December 27 1959 on a dirt road
three miles east of Fingal Bay."

"An adult male toad was observed during
amplexus with an adult female toad."

"At least three factors appeared
quite unique about the situation."

"First, the female was dead,
and had been for some time."

"It appeared as if she had
fallen victim to a car."

"The limbs were already stiff."

"The abdomen greatly distended and
the smell of putrefaction about her."

"Secondly, it is strange that the male
does not note the female's condition."

"Thirdly, the time and place we
encountered this pair was unusual."

"It was 14.00 hrs on a sunny afternoon,
but more interesting was the location."

"The middle of the road."

"The sex drive appears strong enough in
toads to explain his taking her but .."

"His continuance through a possible eight
hours of daylight seems rather strange."

When we first came up north, we had
friends who had two little girls.

And these little girls had
the cane toads as pets.

Instead of little dollies, they
had these cane toads.

They had little dresses made up for them,
little skirts, beds and a doll's house.

They used to dress the toads up and
tuck them into their little beds.

They used to carry them about wrapped up
in baby bunting things, little dollies.

These girls had names for them
and set up little tea parties.

And they'd get these toads, scratch their
tummies and they'd lay back enjoying it.

They'd stick their legs up into
the air and just fall asleep.

They were the most contented, alive,
little dollies that any girl could like.

But just so ugly!

He's dancing.

Hoppy, hoppy lighter, get yourself a ..

Attishoo, attishoo all fall down.

Now .. I wonder what
those spots are for?

I mean, he's got these two
spots and these two big spots ..

Now you get down again.
No, you can't get up.

No, no, no. You get down.
And then I tickle you.

Be quiet.

When I tickle his
tummy he really likes it.

But if I tickle his feet
he doesn't like it.

Sometimes I call him "Greenie", and
sometimes I call him "redhead".

Sometimes I call him "Cane" or my toad.

Sometimes I call him "Dairy Queen".

There's a number of popular
misconceptions about cane toads.

One of which is that they feel disgusting
to touch, but this isn't true at all.

They feel quite dry, not slimy.
The skin is slightly rough.

But it does have a nice silky feeling,
and you don't get warts from them.

A misconception is that just by touching
them, the toads will exude their poison.

This is also not true.

For a toad like this, to exude any of its
poison it has to be severely harassed.

For instance, being picked up in a dog's
mouth and really, severely shaken.

I mean to just handle a toad like this,
doesn't cause it any distress at all.

In fact, I think they quite like it.

"Though a cane toad may look spiteful
and his manners may be frightful."

"He can be delightful .."

Radio: "They are getting smaller around
here. On the day when we had rain here."

"We had about 12 of them on the driveway,
and there was little bugs flying around."

"And they were going after those bugs.
They sure will eat cat food."

"Thank you for that call.
Have a good day."

Yes, if he dogs and cats don't come
straight away to be fed ..

They will have all their food
eaten up by cane toads.

They'll just come in. They love anything.
Gravy and peas, it doesn't matter what.

If the dog doesn't have it, it's gone by
morning. The cane toads don't mess about.

They get into their bit
and they eat it all up.

One of our ways of amusing
ourselves at night-time was to ..

Feed him with cigarettes.

These buffalo-marino toads could
really smoke. They loved them.

It will clean up the slugs, the snails
and a lot of other pests in the garden.

The cane toad like to going
underneath lights.

The lights reflects the
moths, the insects.

And in this way, he goes
and swallows them up.

His reaction is like the same
thing, like a vacuum cleaner.

If he sees something, he sucks it up
like a vacuum cleaner into his body.

Gut content analysis has shown that ..

It will eat virtually anything that is
small enough to get in its mouth, from ..

Frogs, to small birds, to caterpillars,
to insects. Crabs, all sorts of things.

In fact research has shown that the toad
will even try and eat ping-pong balls.

As they pass by the front of them.

So the general selection
of food for a cane toad ..

If it moves or doesn't move, if it can
fit in its mouth, it will try and eat it.

We found situations in which the wretched
toads were eating the native animals.

In one case a toad was gutted, and found
to have in its stomach a marsupial mouse.

This is a very rare, native marsupial,
which I was studying as a student.

One of these really important animals
came out of the stomach of a cane toad!

Anything that moved, that was smaller
than the cane toad was potential prey.

Well, the cane toad is killing
our wildlife not just by .. eating it.

It is also killing it by being
eaten by that wildlife.

This death-adder here, for example, has
no sooner grazed the toad, and it's dead.

The damage that he has inflicted
on the natural environment itself.

You take ibises, wild duck. They've all
been affected by this fellow.

As soon as they eat him, they die.

I have seen snakes,
tai-pans, death adders.

You'd open them up, there'd
be a toad inside them.

He has definitely destroyed most of the
natural habitat around this place.

It was common to have kookaburras, come
in with a cane toad half down its throat.

In a way that a kookaburra could
normally manage a native animal

But half way through the process
of swallowing this cane toad.

It falls out of the tree stone dead,
like it swallowed a cyanide pill.

This is the thing that kind of scared us.
These little walking disaster areas.

Unlike any other kind of prey that the
native animals were accustomed to.

They gave the native animals
no second chance.

No warning, no bitter taste that
makes you drop the animal.

If they bit it, firmly enough behind
the head, they were dead.

So, from that point of view
it's a disaster because ..

It was an introduction of an animal that
the bush simply had no experience with.

And couldn't cope with.

He poses as big a menace as
the German Army did in WW2.

The invasion is on, and I
appeal to everybody to ..

If you see a toad, have no hesitation
in running over and killing the monster.

Well, I line them up with the
driver's side front wheel.

And, it's not quite as easy as it used to
be with the fat tires on the RX4 Mazda.

But I seem to get most of the ones I line
up on the right-hand side of the road.

I know I've made a clean kill, if the
toad faces towards the vehicle.

Because the air that's inside the
toad is trapped within the head ..

And is blown out the back end, and the
toad goes off with a bang like a balloon.

Well, I really go out of my
way to run over cane toads.

Because I have a very profound love of
the wildlife that occurs here naturally.

If it was possible to remove them and
totally eradicate them from Australia.

And I was capable of doing it, I would
spend a lot of time doing exactly that.

If anyone tried to hurt one of my toads.

There would be a lot of noise, and
they would realize, I wasn't a lady.

Toads. I must confess, I don't
like the look of the animal.

I can't have any strong
affection for him.

But I think I've got to give him
credit for doing a good job for us.

The can toad is really an
excellent invasion machine.

It is made in many ways so that it
can move rapidly into an area.

It is able to move human-assisted
as well as under its own steam.

It reproduces incredibly well.

It can produce 30,000 eggs per year.

Start producing after one year, and
maybe produce for sixteen years.

It can eat virtually anything, so food
requirements aren't really a problem.

It can live in most habitats as
long as there is some water.

And it has got excellent
predator defense.

Because it is poisonous at most stages
of its life-cycles, nothing can touch it.

It's a great machine indeed.

These eight toads at one sitting,
can produce 120,000 eggs.

They might do that two
perhaps three times a year.

Come the wet season in the top end,
in the world-famous wetlands.

You are going to have nothing but
a sea of little, black tadpoles.

In the dry season, those famous
worldwide billabongs ..

Are going to be seething with hundreds
of thousands of toads just like these.

From there, the conquest of Northern
Australia is but a hop, skip and a jump.

Our studies indicate that it is possible
that the toad will spread right across ..

The northern part of the Northern
Territory as far as the Kimberley region.

In northern Western Australia,
down the coast of Queensland.

And as far south into New South Wales
as possibly Coffs Harbor.

It's entirely possible when you consider
what were previously thought ..

To be the limitations on the toad, and
what it seems to be able to do now.

The toad is adapting to conditions that
previously might have constrained it.

If the toad is coming in,
basically it is going to come in.

I can't see any simple way of
stopping it at present.

So what we're going to gradually see,
is one of these classic human disasters.

Of a mono-culture gradually, a single
species, replacing many natural species.

So what is really happening here,
is that an ecosystem is at threat.

By being chopped away at the base.

And that will have repercussions
all the way up through ..

The whole of the food-chain in which
the toad has insinuated itself.

So that we don't really know what
the full effects ultimately will be.

But already we've seen ..

That some dominant carnivores in those
ecosystems are probably going to vanish.

At the moment, we have absolutely
no way of controlling .. the cane toad.

"Cane toads coming,
Cane toads coming."

"Main roads are humming
with the cane toad blues."

"Cane toads coming .. Cane toads coming."

"Main roads are humming with
the cane toad blues."

"Cane toads .. when you
going to leave me alone?"

"Heading south, like a case
of foot-and-mouth."

"Cane toad .. you're supposed to stay
in the spring. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

"Cane toads are coming,
cane toads are coming."

"Main roads are humming
with the cane-toad blues."

"Cane toads are coming,
cane toads are coming."

"Main roads are humming
with the cane-toad blues."

"Cane Toad."

"Cane Toad."

"Cane toads are coming.
Cane toads are coming."

"Main roads are humming
with the cane toad blues."

"Cane toads are coming,
cane toads are coming."

"Main roads are humming
with the cane-toad blues."

T-G